Stomach It
by rizahawkaye
Summary: Riza never makes it to Roy in the tunnels, and Roy never finds Envy. Instead, he runs into Ed and Scar who have run into Bradley. Pride, Riza, and Lust make their appearances; Roy makes a difficult decision.


Roy clutched at his chest. There was a fire building inside of him, lapping at the back of his throat, clawing its way out of his mouth. He held back a scream as Riza's hand reached for him, her fingers shaped like daggers. "Lust," he said, the words dripping with venom. His knees hit the dirt beneath him and the pain seared through his legs as he eyed Riza's form.

 _Small, gentle._

"We caught your Lieutenant wondering around where she didn't belong," Bradley's voice rumbled through Roy's head, muffled. "Father thought she'd make a good daughter. She took the transfer without so much as a peep, Mustang, you should be proud of such a sturdy dog."

"You bastards," Ed barked, his body trembling, his hands in tight fists at his sides. Roy's breath hitched in his chest, he felt the anxiety building in his gut. He keeled over, grasping at his stomach, fighting the urge to vomit.

"Lust noticed something funny about the Lieutenant's body, Colonel," Bradley sauntered forward, tapping Roy's shoulder with the blunt of his sword. Somewhere, Roy couldn't tell where, Ed hit the ground. "Lust," he continued, sticking the tip of his sword in the dirt. "Show us what you've found."

Roy's heart beat too fast, he was teetering on unconsciousness. He clamped his eyes shut, rubbed his temples, tried to scrub the image of the Lieutenant's face from his mind. _Focus, focus._ He lifted his face to the Lieutenant's, her amber eyes pouring her soul into his. Her lips parted, a strange smile crept across her face. Her fingers retreated as Lust slipped out of Riza's jacket, tugged Riza's shirt over her head. Ed caught his face in his hands, peering at the dirt as Lust watched Roy through Riza's eyes, snipping Riza's bra into pieces.

Roy finds the oroborous tattoo nestled between Riza's breasts and his stomach plummets. He tries to focus on it, his eyes straining to erase it from her skin, pretend it isn't there, but his view is disrupted when Lust turns Riza's back to him. He tears his eyes off the scar that plasters Riza's back, digs his nails into his thighs. He tries to breathe deeply, calm the deafening sounds of his heart thumping wildly against his ribs. He's aching, he tries to swallow the destruction.

"What is that?" Scar's voice pierces the silence. Disgust, anger drapes thick over the words.

"Good question," Bradley kicks dust up in Roy's direction. "Colonel?"

"I'll turn you all to ash," Roy says, his words coming out jumbled as he chokes on them. He's picking off his ignition gloves one finger at a time when Riza's voice stalls him.

"Colonel," she says, her head twisting, her hands running over her face. "Kill her."

Roy tastes the sick in the air. He presses his palms to the dirt and tries to fall down into the core of the earth to burn, to writhe in the hell. He wants to be anywhere but here, hearing her pull his rank, hearing her plead for pain. He's transported back to the war, melted flesh dancing around in the wind, the tip of her tattoo bearing down on him as she begs him to mutilate her. He's here, and this is worse, and he wants to die, and Ed is up and he's whirring around, exchanging blows with Bradley.

"Roy," she says his name delicately, like a whimper. "Please kill her." She turns to him, there are tears dripping off her chin and her eyes are beggars. Roy can't feel his body but he's up on his feet and he manages a soft, "Riza?"

He's staring at her face and tracing the details of it with his eyes. He can't fathom igniting her features into flames so he tells her, "I can't, I cannot." He shakes his head at her, tears creating a film over his eyes.

"Please," she breathes. She's fighting, Roy can feel it. He sees the pain distort her face and he's been here before, heard her cries, watched her squirm under the scorching weight of everything he'd brought down upon her. "Trust me."

 _I do_.

"I cannot kill you, Lieutenant," he bites back at her, forcing himself forward to wrap her in his coat and hold her face in his hands.

"Scar?" She asks, her breath warm against Roy's face. Before she finishes her plea, Roy turns to Scar and growls, "I'll light you up."

"Colonel, I won't die. I won't die, Colonel," she's pulling at his jacket, hooking her fingers into it, pulling herself into him. "Lust will die, and she has to die, Colonel. They want to make more flame alchemists. I will not birth more flame alchemists, sir, and if they have me then they have you. Burn her _out_."

Her voice was something different, molded from Roy's nightmares. Her hands traveled down his chest to his hands, she pulled one up and placed it over the tattoo between her breasts. "I'll be strong if you will, sir," her eyes were coated in agony, sweat trickled down her temples. Roy swallowed hard, tried to imagine raising a hand to her, tried to imagine the earth shifting under this sin, tried to feel her boiling skin beneath his fingertips.

 _I've been here before._

He steps out of her reach, and every nerve in his body is bellowing at him, scraping his insides and setting him on fire as he lifts his hand to her. "COLONEL!" Edward screams, his automail clanking against Bradley's sword. "SCAR, DO SOMETHING!" Ed's voice is frantic, wild, it tears through Roy's ears in waves, but Scar is dead and Pride has slipped quietly into the atmosphere, his shadows bringing the thick stench of blood. He wraps tendrils around Riza's legs, up her torso, past her tattoo, to her face; taunting. Roy's on autopilot as he flicks his fingers and his world is shattered and she's screeching and Pride is laughing and Ed is pounding his fists into the dirt, Bradley standing over him.

"Colonel, again," she huffs, her body regenerating but Roy's doubled over and he's vomited into the dirt and he watched her flesh fall off her body in ashes and he's hyperventilating and her heavy breathing is filling his lungs for him so he lifts a hand and does it again. Again, and again. Fifty more times and her screams have been etched onto his brain, he's sure he'll never get the smell of her singed skin out of his nose. She's on her knees in front of him and she's not regenerating and for a moment he's relieved, but then her burned flesh begins to flake off, falling to the floor into a neat pile.

"Lieutenant?" He's coughing, she's not responding. It isn't until the whole of her has vanished in front of him and Lust's stone's shattered that he's understood what she's done.

"What'll you do, Colonel?" Pride asks. "You've killed your Lieutenant."

"No," he says, trying to erase the scene in front of him with a word. He stumbles forward, tripping into his vomit and crawling into the pile of Riza. "She lied to me," he groaned, pushing her ashes into a circle, pulling from memory the one thing he'd swore he'd never know. Ed was sobbing, and through his sobs he begged Roy to stop, but Roy had ripped his ignition gloves off and was fixated on his circle. When he was done, Pride dropped Scar's body into the dust.

"You'll need a toll," he grinned.

"It won't work," Ed choked.

Roy pressed his palms to the circle and was engulfed in an electric blue light. Things went black before he was in nothingness, a door looming in front of him, a figure crouching beneath it.

"Colonel Roy Mustang," a million voices hissed. "You killed her."

"Give her back. You know what happened, now give her back," Roy shouted, not aware of where he was or who he was speaking to. Only aware that he will never feel his Lieutenant's warmth again or hear her voice or see her tears.

"There is nothing you can give me that would equal the value of a human life," the voices cooed. "You must pay the price."

Doors creaked open, Roy was pulled backward into images, knowledge coursed through him and he saw her. Over and over again he saw her. The image of her, of his sparks reigning down on her like lighting, was beaten behind his eyelids. When he was through, when the ride had ended and he could feel her between his fingers, he opened his eyes to nothing.

"The fifth sacrifice," Pride crowed. "Fantastic."


End file.
